Joseph Belbruno Blog

  What we can learn from Spain’s housing crisis  A Financial Times Europe 3 Oct 2026 John Burn-Mur doch john.burn-mur doch@ft.com  Although hous ing crises have been smoul der ing across much of the highin come world for a dec ade or more, they have gen er ally ten ded to rank some way down the polit ical agenda. That may be about to change, with reports sug gest ing Span ish prime min is ter Pedro Sánchez is con sid er ing call ing an early elec tion in a bid to resolve mount ing pub lic and polit ical dis con tent over spiralling rents and prices after his flag ship hous ing bill was rejec ted by par lia ment yes ter day.  Mass protests were sparked recently by the case of 87-year-old Mari car men Abas cal. She was served an evic tion notice after her pre vi ously rent-con trolled flat was bought by a cor por ate land lord which sought to increase the rent to a level well above her income. Much of the anger has centred on the role of so-called “vul ture funds” in t...

  How the eviction of an 87-year-old became Spain's 'last straw' It was an image of an 87-year-old woman on a stretcher, wheeled out by paramedics, that sparked a national movement. She was not sick. Rather, evicted. Maricarmen Abascal, who uses a wheelchair, was stretchered out of her Madrid home. (Getty Images: Luciano Lima) Maricarmen Abascal had lived in her Madrid apartment for more than 70 years. She took over the lease her father signed in 1956, and enjoyed capped rent. Then, in 2018, her apartment was bought by an investment firm. The monthly rent soon soared from €500 ($811) to €1,650 ($2,678). And Maricarmen, a pensioner with a disability whose monthly benefits total €1,350 ($2,192), was forced out in a court-ordered eviction.  A sign supporting the pensioner reads: "This system must burn. Maricarmen, you are not alone." (Reuters: Susana Vera) For Spaniards, the eviction stirred up a deep-seated anger over a housing crisis that has only worsened in recen...

  Larry Ellison Risk Exposed by Paramount and Oracle Debt Binges Larry Ellison at the White House in 2025.Photographer: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images Save Translate 5:20 As Paramount Skydance Corp. and Oracle Corp. vault into the ranks of corporate America’s biggest borrowers, their links to the same man — billionaire Larry Ellison — are starting to stir angst on Wall Street. The assumption among many investors has been that Ellison would step in to support Paramount if it got in financial trouble after taking on $52 billion of additional debt this week to help pay for its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. But with much of the Ellison family’s wealth tied to Oracle shares as the company undertakes its own capital intensive AI buildout, the worry is the value of that safety net could come under pressure just when Paramount needs it most. Those concerns are already being reflected in the market, money managers say. The cost to insure the debt of both companies against default...

  CAPITAL ACCOUNT By Greg Ip Is AI’s 9% GDP Goal Plausible? Believers in the artificial- intelligence boom need to take a close look at this number: 9% of GDP. That is how much American businesses and consumers eventually have to spend per year on the services of companies like Anthropic and OpenAI to justify the sums being committed to the technology right now. Is it plausible that Americans will spend as much of their income on this one technology as they do on food? Roughly twice what the nation pays for all forms of energy or all computers and software? Seven times what consumers spend on phone, streaming, and internet services combined? You should be skeptical. Even the most transformative inventions run into the law of diminishing returns: each additional dollar a user spends yields less additional productivity than the last. That imposes a natural ceiling. The question, of course, is where that ceiling is. Whether or not you think 9% of GDP is right, you have to care, becaus...

 The stupidity of Western ignorant students surpasses all understanding. Part of the problem is the utter indolence of governments to educate the young. Students urged to call off October 7 Palestine march Jessica Sharkey - Crime Correspondent Police have urged student groups planning a pro-Palestinian march on the third anniversary of the October 7 massacre to reschedule, warning of the distress it would cause to the Jewish community. Student groups plan to march on Wednesday from King’s College London and University College London to mark the anniversary of the attacks in which Hamas killed more than 1,200 civilians and took 251 hostages. The Metropolitan Police said they had been unable to find the organisers to ask them to “carefully consider” the effect the march would have. James Harman, deputy assistant commissioner, said nobody had been willing to take responsibility as the organiser. Police have also asked King’s College London, the London School of Economics, Soas Univers...

  1/2 Unione fragile di Federico Fubini Su Bce, debiti sovrani e inflazione tira aria di tempesta perfetta La Francia e il rischio di contagio finanziario Al vertice Christine Lagarde, presidente della Bce. Il suo mandato scadrà il 31 ottobre del 2027 L a tempesta perfetta non è sempre la più alta per intensità, ma la più ampia per la varietà di ingredienti: finanziari, politici, geopolitici e di lotta nelle istituzioni. Se questo è il criterio, allora in molti nei mercati finanziari (e qualcuno nella Banca centrale europea) si staranno chiedendo se in questo momento ci siamo. E nessuno come Christine Lagarde, la presidente della Bce che appare ormai quasi in uscita, avrebbe mai voluto trovarsi qui. Non è tanto per l’inflazione di settembre in area euro, che ieri è uscita al 3,8%: più alto rispetto ad agosto e soprattutto anche rispetto alle attese degli analisti; né solo per il mercato del lavoro negli Stati Uniti che, salvo revisioni, il mese scorso sembra aver registrato una fre...